Alan N. Shapiro
media theory,
science fiction theory,
future design research
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Baudrillard und Trek-nologie, von Alan N. Shapiro
Beginnen wir mit dem Ende der sechziger Jahre in New York, dem Ort meiner Kindheit. Als guter Jude sollte ich eine jüdische Erziehung bekommen. Stattdessen liebte ich Star Trek. Alles, was ich weiß, habe ich von Star Trek gelernt. Unter anderem auch, die Naturwissenschaften zu lieben. Das machte mich zu einem guten Amerikaner.
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Star Trek: How the New Comes into the World
Most scientists, academics, and journalists who write about Star Trek claim to be fans and lovers of the various Starfleet Captains and their crews. But their customary methodologies function to deny to Star Trek its true originality as the creator of a reality-shaping “science fiction” that formatively influences culture, ideas, technologies, and even “hard sciences.”
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Star Trek: 20 Basic Principles
Star Trek Basic Principle #1: Radical Uncertainty Captain’s Log, Supplemental: “We are seeing things that cannot possibly exist, yet they are undeniably real.” In its indeterminacy and paradox, the object discovers us. Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle holds that the degrees of my knowing the position and speed of quantum particles are inversely proportional to each other.
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Beaubourg, Quai Branly, and the Simulacrum of Jean Baudrillard, by René Capovin
Although I am not a big Quentin Tarantino fan, I absolutely loved Inglourious Basterds. One of the things that I loved about it is that four languages – French, English, German, and Italian – all play important roles in the film. So now for some quadrophonic Baudrillard.
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Die Bibliothek der Zukunft – The Library of the Future, von/by Alan N. Shapiro
Presented at the Wikipedia Critical Point of View Conference in Leipzig, Germany, Sept. 26, 2010 Die Bibliothek der Zukunft – The Library of the Future in German and English At this conference, I was on a panel together with Sabria David. Sabria is an expert in value-oriented business communication and corporate brand development.
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My Hometown is Roslyn, Long Island, New York
In 1980, I sat inside my hometown library in the “haute bourgeoise” town of Roslyn and read all the books they had about the student-worker near-revolution in May-June 1968 in France: books like Alain Touraine’s The Movement of May and Alfred Willener’s The Action-Image of Society.
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Baudrillard and Trek-nology (Or Everything I Know I Learned From Watching Star Trek and Reading Jean Baudrillard), by Alan N. Shapiro
We should be greatly mistaken were we to view science fiction as an escape from everyday reality: on the contrary, it is an extrapolation from the irrational tendencies of that reality through the free exercise of narrative invention.
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Passing: Franco La Polla
Franco La Polla died in Pavia, Italy on February 27, 2009. From 2004 to 2007, La Polla was Professor of the History of Cinema, and Director of the Department of Music and Theatre (DAMS) at the University of Bologna. For 30 years, La Polla was Professor of the History of American Literature.
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The Car of the Future, folding study, by Nick Pugh
All images © Copyright Nick Pugh and Alan N. Shapiro, 2010
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The Car of the Future, alternate modes, by Nick Pugh
All images © Copyright Nick Pugh and Alan N. Shapiro, 2010
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The Car of the Future, detail sketches, by Nick Pugh
All images © Copyright Nick Pugh and Alan N. Shapiro, 2010
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